The epidemic of farmers' suicide is the real barometer of the stress
under which Indian agriculture and Indian farmers have been put by
globalization and liberalization of agriculture. Across the country
farmers are taking the desperate step of ending their life because of
the new pressures building upon them as a result of globalization and
corporate takeover leading to spread of capital-intensive agriculture.
Indebtedness is an inevitable outcome of the corporate model of
industrial agriculture. We are paying the cost of liberalization and
globalization of our agriculture with lives of our brethren farmers
–men and women.
But surprisingly, the government policy level response continues to be
insensitive to this reality and all efforts are being made to hide the
real reasons for agrarian crisis and offer corporatization of
agriculture as the solution for the agrarian distress. The UPA
government under your leadership is intensely pushing for the corporate
agenda for agricultural development and opening up of the agriculture
sector to the corporate capital. It is being done through facilitating
the corporate ownership of land by abolishing the ceiling laws and
promoting special economic zones (SEZ), contract farming, private
markets (APMC), retail chains, seed monopolization, monopolization of
our agriculture research (through Indo-US Knowledge Deal), promotion of
GMOs, excessive import of food grains (esp. wheat) to depress domestic
price for facilitating corporate procurement thus furthering the
dependence of farmers on the corporate sector for both procurement of
inputs and marketing of output. This corporate agriculture syndrome
continues to govern the policy making of your government.
In view of the above, we urge for:
Pro-Farmer Policy: So far the UPA government tried to deal with the
agrarian crisis and farmers suicide in installments and through package
deals, e.g. the Vidarbha Relief Package, which brings temporary relief
to limited number of farmers and is not long-term solutions. We demand
that the Central and state governments need to strengthen all the
necessary conditions for subsistence farming. It must introduce
comprehensive policy measures to protect land and its produce for
farmers and for that purpose withdraw operations of free market access
to all lands and agriculture as well as ban contract farming and other
practice that affect the farmers' exclusive ownership over their land.
The Government of India must immediately come up with a genuinely pro
farmer policy – one that is reflective of the demands of farmers and
not corporations, to stop farmers’ suicide and one that will make
agriculture a viable occupation for our farmers and agricultural labour
across India.
Include Farmers in the Sixth Pay Commission: In the 6th Pay Commission,
nearly 42 lakh central government employees and two crore state
government employees will receive a salary bonanza that will cost the
state exchequer more than Rs 100,000 crore a year. As said before, the
farm income over the years has declined and there is increasing
destitution among farmers. Like everyone else, farmers, too, need an
adequate monthly take-home package that takes care of their family
needs and leaves them with a little surplus to sow the next crop.
Probably the only way to ensure the economic viability of the farm
sector is to enlarge the scope of the sixth pay commission to include
farmers. Based on minimum land-holdings, and de-coupled from
production, there is immediate need to ensure farmers get an assured
income, similar to the European Union which has introduced decoupled
payments for its farmers to protect them from declining incomes. India
ought to follow a similar approach and include farmers in the Sixth Pay
Commission. We therefore demand for an “income support” for Indian
farmers with a ‘minimum take home’ income based on their land holding
size. We also support a similar approach for the millions of landless
labourers who also needs income support for their survival.
Stop Autonomous Liberalization and Keep Agriculture out of WTO: The
farmers of India are concerned about the recent developments in the WTO
negotiations as well as the autonomous trade liberalization in
agriculture, e.g. lowering of tariff on edible oil, cotton, wheat and
other commodities. The Falconer draft paper on agriculture, which is
being negotiated in Geneva, ensures continuation of massive subsidies
to farmers by the developed countries, but it ignores basic issues of
developing countries such as special products, special safeguard
mechanisms and tariff escalations. We believe that the basic agenda of
the Doha round is “market access” through lowering of tariff in
developing countries. India is experiencing drastic impact of removal
of quantitative restrictions and internal trade liberalization in
agriculture and any further lowering of tariff on agricultural goods
would be disastrous for small and marginal farmers. Moreover, our
agriculture is being sacrificed in return for a very miniscule gain
from Doha Round as indicated by the World Bank and Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace studies, which shows that the entire gain in
agriculture to the 110 developing countries, including India, would be
to the tune of just US $6.7 billion dollars or Rs. 35000 crores. We
therefore demand that the government must immediately come out with a
white paper on gains and losses from the Doha round before making any
commitment at Geneva, re-introduce quantitative restriction to protect
agriculture from cheap subsidized imports, stop autonomous
liberalization in agriculture and increase import tariff on edible oil,
cotton and wheat to at least 75% and introduce proper safeguards to
protect our farmers in view of FTAs and RTAs which India is entering
into. We also demand that India should insist on keeping agriculture
out of the WTO.
Better Procurement Prices: For last 12 years since India has joined the
WTO, the farmers are experiencing decline in domestic farm prices
caused by liberalization of imports and removal of quantitative
restrictions (QRs) which opened floodgates for dumping of cheap
subsidized food grains from outside. With the integration of markets,
the Indian farmers have also been exposed to the volatile world
agriculture market which is influenced by the cheap subsidized produce
from developed countries. Moreover, under the pressure from the World
Bank and IMF to curtail subsidies, the UPA government is also thinking
on the lines of stopping the minimum support price mechanisms, which,
we believe, is an imperative for farmers’ income security. This would
be a great injustice to Indian farmers if MSP is done away with. Just
as no just society can allow the super exploitation through low wages,
no society can allow the super exploitation of farmers through low and
even negative return to farming. We therefore demand that the
government must strengthen MSP mechanisms, fix the procurement price of
all agricultural produce before the sowing season, increase the
procurement price of all crops which should cover their cost of
production and ensure procurement of all agricultural produce for which
Minimum Support Price (MSP) has been announced. We also urge that no
procurement or import should be allowed below that price. Tariffs and
anti dumping measures must be used to ensure that artificially cheap
subsidized commodities are not dumped on the Indian market leading to
loss of farmers’ incomes.
Stop Wheat Import: We are also witnessing, in last two years, a drain
of our foreign exchange on importation of wheat at double the domestic
price (of Rs. 1600 per quintal). The deliberate move to import wheat
every year is a step to push our farmers out of farming. The
implications on the nation’s food security are also grave. Imported
wheat is also bringing in new weeds, pests and diseases, which will
adversely affect Indian agriculture. By offering a lower Minimum
Support Price (MSP) and resorting to imports to meet the buffer stock
requirements, the government aims to dismantle the price and
procurement mechanisms. This is also a deliberate attempt to subvert
the Food Corporation of India and the Public Distribution System.
Instead of importing wheat at higher price to benefit multinational
grain corporations like Cargill and ITC, we demand that the government
should offer a higher MSP to its farmers. A beginning should be made
with an immediate announcement of an MSP of at least Rs. 1200 per
quintal for wheat before the sowing begins.
Ban Commercial release of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs): Indian
farmers are much concerned that despite large-scale failure of
transgenic cotton (Bt. cotton) in the country, the UPA government has
given permission for large scale trials of the first GM food crop in
the country in the form of Bt Brinjal. Besides Brinjal, several other
GM crops are also on the verge of being released for commercial
cultivation. This goes against the recommendations of the National
Commission on Farmers. The bias of the Genetic Engineering Approval
Committee (GEAC) in favour of biotech industries is evident from the
manner in which serious environmental, human and animal health issues
are being ignored. Working in tandem with the companies, the GEAC is
turning India into a dumping ground for untested and risky GM crops and
food. We also demand a complete ban on commercial release of all GM
crops and foods in the country. The decision of the GEAC is also being
influenced by the Indo-US Knowledge Initiative (between India and US)
which is geared towards bring in the second Green revolution in the
form of “Gene Revolution” to promote production and marketing of
hazardous and unsustainable genetically engineered seeds and foods.
Given that Indian agriculture does not have anything in common with
American farming, given that we have vast amounts of experience,
knowledge and capabilities on a variety of subjects within the country,
given that the Knowledge Initiative does not seem to have any benefits
for Indian farmers but only negative implications, given that the
current agrarian crisis facing Indian farmers needs other fundamentally
different solutions, we demand that the UPA government must immediately
withdraw from this deal and stops its implementation. The Movement also
requests you to actively support ecological alternatives in agriculture
instead of promoting GMOs and find solutions which reflect a vision for
the sustainability of agriculture and of the farming livelihoods in the
country.
We are therefore hoping that you will immediately take notice of our demands and take necessary actions.
Signed by
Mahender Singh Tikait, President, Bhartiya Kissan Union, India
Ajmer Singh Lakhowal, State President, BKU Punjab
Jagdish Singh, State President, BKU Madhya Pradesh
Gurnam Singh, State President, BKU Haryana
Yudhvir Singh, Spokesman, Indian Coordination Committee of Farmers Movements
